The invention relates to a method for thinning a sample, the method comprising:                providing a sample attached to a probe,        providing a sample carrier, said sample carrier showing a rigid structure, said rigid structure showing an boundary to which the sample can be attached,        attaching the sample to the boundary of the rigid structure, and        exposing the sample to a milling process or an etching process so as to at least partially thin the sample.        
The invention further relates to a sample carrier equipped to perform the method according to the invention.
Such a method is known from “The total release method for FIB in-situ TEM sample preparation”, T. M. Moore, Microscopy Today, Vol. 13, No. 4, pages 40-42, more specifically page 40, column 2 as “The total release method for in-situ lift-out”.
Such a method is used in e.g. the semiconductor industry, where samples are taken from semiconductors for inspection/analysis in e.g. a Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) by irradiating the wafers with a particle beam, such as a beam of gallium ions. The impinging beam causes removal of material, also known as milling or sputtering of the material.
As known to the person skilled in the art, a semiconductor sample to be inspected in a TEM must be extremely thin, preferably 50 nm or less. As the sample taken out of a semiconductor wafer is often much thicker, the sample needs to be prepared by thinning it after its extraction from the wafer. To obtain a sample with the correct orientation (e.g. along certain crystal orientations of the wafer of which the sample was a part), the sample orientation must be controlled to within e.g. 1 degree during the milling process. Incorrect alignment may result in warping of the sample during milling, but may e.g. also result in problems during the subsequent inspection/analysis.
In the known method a sample is cut from the semiconductor wafer. The sample may be cut in e.g. a Focused Ion Beam apparatus (FIB) in two ion milling steps, thereby freeing a wedge from the wafer. After separation the sample is then welded to a probe using e.g. Ion Beam Induced Deposition (IBID) and transported to a TEM sample carrier (the so-named lift-out grid). The sample is then welded to the sample carrier (using e.g. IBID) and the probe is detached from the sample by cutting the probe tip. The sample is then exposed to a milling process in the form of FIB milling to thin it to the required thickness.
A disadvantage of the known method is that welding the probe to the sample and severing the sample from the probe takes time. This reduces throughput, which obviously is very important in the industrial environment of the semiconductor industry.
It is remarked that a method is known in which the sample is picked-up with an electrically charged glass needle without making a weld, after which the sample is laid on a conductive membrane (the so-named ex-situ method described in the same article “The total release method for FIB in-situ TEM sample preparation”, T. M. Moore, Microscopy Today, Vol. 13, No. 4, pages 40-42, more specifically page 40, column 2). However, it is then not possible to thin the sample after extraction of the sample from the wafer.
Ex-situ lift-out also makes it more difficult to do so-named end-pointing. End-pointing is the process performed to determine when the thinning must be stopped and is preferably done by observing e.g. the electron transparency of the sample during the thinning process (either continuously or by temporary interrupting the thinning process). End-pointing then requires free access to the sample from both sides: one side to direct an electron beam to and the other side to detect transmitted electrons from. Using the ex-situ method, both sides of the sample are formed between the two surfaces of the wafer, and are thus not freely accessible.
Another disadvantage of the known method is that, after attaching the sample to the sample carrier, the orientation of e.g. the crystallographic axes in the sample with respect to the sample carrier is insufficiently reproducible. As a result human intervention is needed to determine the orientation and align the sample during the milling process. This hinders automation of the thinning process.
The invention aims to provide a method with higher throughput and improved parallelism between sample and sample carrier.